Author Archives: Bill Bertolino

With the Thanksgiving holiday coming up, don’t think lawmakers are content with taking the week off.
It appears Gov. Jan Brewer and key lawmakers are planning – or at least strongly considering – a special session as early as this week to deal with the fallout from Thursday’s court decision to re-install the embattled chairwoman of the state’s redistricting commission.

Mesa businessman Wil Cardon branded himself as the anti-politician, an outsider who lacks a “politician’s polish,” as he put it, during a Nov. 15 speech at his new campaign headquarters near Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.

But the U.S. Senate candidate who is challenging Congressman Jeff Flake for the Republican nomination appears anything but politically naïve. In fact, he sounded very much like a politician.

In the high-stakes job to redraw Arizona’s political districts, much has been debated about the idea of “transparency.”

The Independent Redistricting Commission, apparently concerned about the public perception of its decision to hire a mapping firm with historic ties to Democratic causes, recently established a rule intended to allay fears of partisanship driving the mapping process.

But what about the commission itself? Shouldn’t its members be held to the same standard?

If we are to take her staff’s word for it, U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords will retain — at least — her Democratic seat in Congress in 2012.

In the best-case scenario, she would be the heavy front-runner in a U.S. Senate race with Republican Congressman Jeff Flake, whose early entry into the contest has thus far scared off all other GOP contenders.

Even as 2010′s votes are being counted, Republican Grant Woods said he’s considering a possible 2014 gubernatorial run as an independent candidate. The former state Attorney General and longtime adviser to U.S. Sen. John McCain, said he’s had conversations with ...

Ben Quayle got the big name. Jon Hulburd got the bigger money. At least that’s how it went according to the last-minute financial disclosures leading up to today’s election. Quayle’s campaign reported to federal elections officials Monday (Nov. 1) that ...

Many Democrats in the state are running to the middle. And many Republicans are running to the right. So it’s interesting strategy that in an election cycle where the GOP is energized and on the attack, a political newcomer in ...

Heading into the final stretch of the general election campaign, Democrat Jon Hulburd is making a last-ditch effort to court women voters in Arizona’s 3rd Congressional District. It’s clearly a group he’s appealed to before, as earlier Christian radio ads ...

David Schweikert’s campaign appears to be falsely claiming that a Democratic activist and Harry Mitchell’s campaign conspired to damage Schweikert’s signs. The claim, issued in a press release Oct. 26 with the headline “We Caught Them!,” stems from a dust-up ...